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Leopold Mon
Oscar Leopold Mon (called Leopold or Leo by most, Oscar by his mother, Louis or Leonard by his master) is the apprentice of Basador Melberine, a Shornish magelord. As the unfortunate result of a magical experiment, he was unwittingly frozen in time between 4E 7 and 4E 28. 'Appearance:' Leopold is a gangly youth with wild mouse-brown hair and childish features. A flat nose, wide green eyes and thick eyebrows that don't quite match somehow give him an air of permanent confusion or surprise. He has attempted wizardly beard growth, but with minimal success, and so is more or less clean shaven. He dresses with little care, looking as much like a down-on-his-luck troubadour or travelling merchant as a mage. He wears a patched leather jerkin over an ill-fitting woollen tunic, and stuffs his breeches into his battered boots. Living, as he does, in the mountains of Shornhelm, Leo usually wears a fur lined and slightly singed cloak to ward off the weather. 'Skills:' In theory, Leo is trained to apprentice level in all schools of magic. That said, Magister Melberine's adherence to modern arcane classification, and indeed to the tenets of proper teaching, is limited at best. What Leopold knows, he knows mostly from observation and exceptionally irresponsible independent study. As such, the spells at his command are an eclectic mix, but he can't be faulted for his general competence in the arcane arts. Other than that, he is quite talented at dodging hurled projectiles and keeping his head down for angry moments. Living with a wizard lord will teach an apprentice a thing or two about tact and sidestepping, both literal and figurative. It could hardly be called a skill, but as a result of countless hours as a test subject, Leo's body often responds unexpectedly to magic. It is a blessing and a curse – it could be that he will soak up a spell unflinchingly, or that some blessing will scorch his hair off. It makes for considerable inconvenience but endless amusement for his master. 'Equipment:' Basador Melberine has a rather unwizardly habit of throwing out dozens of items a year in fits of aggressive boredom, and Leo has gained a reasonably impressive collection of his own simply by skimming the “rubbish” before jettisoning it into Oblivion, incinerating it, hurling it from the balcony, or whatever else his master demands. Most notably, he has a pair of slightly ill-fitting boots that allow him to spring several feet into the air and land safely (assuming he doesn't lose them on the way up or down), a lexicon inscribed with “typical Dwemeri claptrap and perversion” (totally unreadable to Leopold of course), and a dried Clannfear claw. Aside from that, Leopold carries a few useful scrolls and potions and a silver dagger. 'Background:' Leopold was born in the Shornish port of Penrithian to servants in one of that town's handful of fine houses. It was quite by chance that, rather than growing up into a footman or a kitchen boy, he became a wizard's apprentice. Basador Melberine's former apprentice, ready to bail out of his master's ill-steered ship, made a stop in Penrithian on some queer errand. He found himself spending the night in the servant's quarters of Leo's generous master, where the young boy was fascinated by his magical trinkets and far off eyes. Living in a basement in Penrithian he had never met anyone who had seen such fantastical things as this wizard's apprentice, or who knew so much about the workings of the world and beyond. He was then, perfect for the apprentice's needs. When the apprentice left Penrithian, he took the young Leo (happy and bewildered) from his parents (more or less ambivalent) with the false promise of regular visitations). He took his prize as far as Basador Melberine's entry hall, where he was dumped without much ceremony on a barely-aware master. The wizard had only just grasped who this “Oscar Leopold Mon, sir” was when his former apprentice was barrelling down the stairs with a pack on his shoulder. And that was that. At times Leo wondered why the old apprentice fled so keenly. At others he contemplated doing the same . Sometimes he just wondered why the apprentice had bothered to find a replacement. But he could never flee the tower – magic captivated him. Even when he was being launched through the air, or dunked into Oblivion, or burnt to a crisp, it was worth the suffering to see the mysteries of the universe shake slowly free of their esoteric chains. It was with some trepidation but a fair amount of interest that he submitted to His Potency's latest experiment in chronomancy, the experiment that left him perfectly frozen in time for twenty one years. 'Personality:' An inquisitive young man hungry not just for knowledge but for understanding, Leopold adores magic and the finer points of metaphysical theory. His isolated life and his unrelatable fixation with the arcane make him less personable than he might otherwise be, as he finds a majority of people to be some combination of dull, confusing, and misguided. He does, however, see them as basically good. To him, “people” (nebulously defined) are the centre of it all (even more nebulously defined). While some are unpleasant, or even turned to evil, they must surely be an unwitting part of the great endeavour, whatever it might be. As a result of this, and of knowing so few people he can count them on one hand, Leo is trusting to a fault and little inclined to look beyond face value, a skill he finds it impossible to carry beyond the metaphysical fields. 'Character Summary:' An eager and inquisitive apprentice, but more often a guinea pig. Leopold Mon is to be sent off into a world he understands only as a metaphysical conundrum without such basic knowledge as the current decade. He has spent two decades of his life an ageless living statue and may yet be rudely awakened to the passage of time. Category:Characters Category:Shornhelm